As AV turns 15, let's take a look back at the site we descended from. Below you can explore the database Olivier compiled at Animated Movies during its existence, as it last appeared online in October 2003.
| Animated Movies was launched by Olivier Mouroux in 1999. In addition to a daily news report, he also created a database of information about past, current, and upcoming films. In 2003, he took a job in the industry and had to give up his work on the site. Several fans of Animated Movies decided to take on the task of keeping the news portion of his site going, and founded what is now Animated Views. As AV turns 15, let's take a look back at the site we descended from. Below you can explore the database Olivier compiled at Animated Movies during its existence, as it last appeared online in October 2003. |
Cast * Origin of the Story * Creative Development * Interesting Facts * The Naked Truth!
Directed
by: Wolfgang Reitherman, John Lounsbery, Art Stevens
Written by: Ken Anderson, Ted Berman
Music by: Sammy Fain, Carol Connors, Ayn Robbins
Released on: June 22, 1977
Running Time: 77 minutes
Box-Office: $30 million in the U.S.
CAST
Miss Bianca... Eva Gabor
Bernard... Bob Newhart
Penny...
Michelle
Stacy
Rufus... John McIntire
Orville... Jim Jordan
Madame Medusa... Geraldine Page
Mr. Snoops... Joe Flynn
Nero and Brutus... Candy
Candido
Digger... Dub Taylor
Deadeye... George Lindsey
Luke... Pat Buttram
Owl... John Fiedler
Famous film actress Geraldine Page voiced the slimy
Madame Medusa, but the live-action reference was based on animator Milt
Kahl's ex-wife -- whom he didn't particularly care for. Kahl was so exacting
a perfectionist during his animation of Medusa that his assistants had
a hard time living up to his standards. As a consequence, Kahl ended up
doing almost all the animation for his evil creation himself. Madame Medusa
was Mr. Kahl's last great character for Disney. Shortly after "The Rescuers,"
the talented animator retired.
The
story of
The Rescuers was suggested by characters in several books
by Margery Sharp (The Rescuers and Miss Bianca). Although
these stories found popular success worldwide, it took writer Larry Clemmons
and his staff more than a year to develop the final script. "It doesn't
happen overnight," said Clemmons. "We start with a series of rough storyboard
sketches, then try to establish our characters. The film's director and
animators get involved at this point. The voice and personality of the
actor chosen to speak for the character becomes a major influence, too.
"Often," Clemmons added, "we'll develop one major sequence, say in the
middle of the film, then work towards the beginning and the end. Along
the way, of course, we keep making changes, until we have the final story
and script ready for the animators. They take the characters, situations
and words and make it all come to life."
While
it's often true that life imitates art, for at least one of the characters
in The Rescuers the reverse was true. The physical appearance of
Mr. Snoops, Madame Medusa's luckless sidekick, is a broad caricature of
animation historian/critic John Culhane who spent many hours "snooping"
out stories for the New York Times and Reader's Digest during the formative
stages of the film. When Culhane first saw an exaggerated caricature of
himself on screen as Mr. Snoops he was flattered at being a part of Disney
history and the art form he so admired. By his own account, he hadn't realized
that he had achieved "immortality until a young daughter of some friends
recognized him as the figure on her "Rescuers" lunch pail and insisted
on staying up late to meet him.
The slow evolution of an animated feature allows flexibility and sometimes turns mere supporting characters into stars. In The Rescuers, the character of Evinrude, a dynamic dragonfly, was expanded as a result of early test animation, and went on to become one of the film's highlights.
The
Rescuers was a traditional movie in that it was still made under the
guidance of the old guard -Woolie Reitherman, Ollie Hohnston, Frank Thomas,
Milt Kahl, Ken Anderson, Larry Clemmons- but it was the first feature to
display a significant influence from the next generation of artists.
During the production of Robin Hood
(1973) Disney finally began to recruit new animators. For more than two
decades, the studio had been relying on a small corps of experimented artists.
The Disney staff was generally acknowledged as the best in the world, and
there was little impetus to search for new talent -Disney was not the only
studio that failed to recruit young animators; very few artists entered
the field between the mid-1950s and the mid-1970s.
Even the death of Walt failed to shake the comfortable assumption that
this skilled team would continue working
indefinitely. But as members of the group began to retire and die,
it became necessary to find and train new artists to
replace them. Disney hired twenty-five new artists between 1970
and 1977, including Gary Goldman, John Pomeroy, Glen Keane and Don Bluth.
The
Rescuers represented the first real collaboration between the two groups
of animators.
The
Rescuers as we know it today was actually the second script developed for
the film. The Rescuers first script dealt with a totalitarian government.
Bernard and Bianca were going to save a young man much older than Bianca.
Not much is known on this situation, but the story was practically completed
when it was decided the idea just was not working. The following quote
is from a piece of conceptual art from the first script:
"December 24th, Bright and early on this day before Mamelouk awakened we looked into the prison guest book like Bianca had suggested - There we found Peter's name - He was booked in suite 269-A - He had a cel all to himself withIn Margery Sharp's books Rescue Aid Society was known as the Prisoners' Aid Society. Mamelouk is a cat that Miss
southern exposure."
The original script was adapted from The Rescuers by Margery
Sharp and is published by Little, Brown. If you are
interested in the original story that never was, almost any bookstore
will carry this in their children's section.
Disney's animation
team considered reusing Cruella, from the 1961 film 101
Dalmatians, in The Rescuers. But, keeping with Walt's traditions
they decided to not rehash one of their characters, no matter how popular
in a second full-length animated feature. However, similarities between
Cruella and Medusa are evident. Most, notably the car scenes. Where Cruella
and Medusa have close-ups on their furious faces through the car windsheilds.
Bernard and Bianca
were supposed to go to a mouse supply room in the International Rescue
Aid Society Headquarters. In here, they were supposed to have bins full
of items Bernard and Bianca would need on their journey. Once they
were packed Rescue Aid would then send them off. Ken Anderson drew conceptual
art of this storage room, what was inside of it, etc. This idea never made
it past this stage.
In one scene,
Bernard, Bianca and Penny are in the cave trying to retrieve the Devil's
Eye out of the skull of a dead man. Ken Anderson's Multiple Choice Layouts
displayed Bianca taking pictures of the skull and Bernard inside the cave.
In The Rescuers,
the animation team originally wanted Bernard and Bianca to be married.
But, as it turned out that did not happen until The
Rescuers Down Under.
The Rescue Aid
Society Headquarters was originally just going to be a hole in the wall
somewhere until the idea of a luggage bag in the UN building came up.
The Swamp Folk
in the movie where going to be carrying a flag that said Swamp Volunteers.
This idea was scrapped because this was the only time the Swamp Folk would
need to help rescue a child -or anything else for that matter!- in Devil's
Bayou.
Comedian Bob Newhart
provided the voice of Bernard, the shy, but sly janitor who becomes a mouse
with a mission. Lovely Eva Gabor lent her charm and personality to the
vivacious and daring Miss Bianca. The late Geraldine Page, renowned for
her many prestigious stage and screen roles, turned in a "gem" of a performance
as the wickedly wacky kidnapper, Madame Medusa.
The Rescuers
was Disney's most commercially successful animated feature at the time
of its initial release, generating over $40 million in worldwide rentals
and out-grossing such strong competition as Star Wars in many countries
including France and Germany.
It also proved
to be a hit with many film critics. The Washington Post called it, "certainly
the best Disney feature since 'Mary Poppins"' while Variety hailed it as
a "special event...a film which blends visual sophistication and emotional
simplicity, along with the upbeat humor that marks the best of Disney product;"
Charles Champlin of the Los Angeles Times called it "the funniest, the
most inventive, the least self-conscious, the most coherent and fast moving...
and probably most important of all, it is also the most touching (feature
length animated film from Disney) in a decade or more."
The song "Someone's
Waiting For You" was nominated for an Oscar in 1978.
Historically, "The Rescuers" marked an important turning point and a "changing
of the guard" at The Walt Disney Studios: it was the last animation assignment
for the old school of Disney artists (affectionately referred to by Walt
Disney as his "Nine Old Men") and the debut film for a new generation of
talented animators, including Don Bluth (An American Tail, The
Land Before Time, Anastasia).
The
photographic image of a topless woman can be spotted in the background
of The Rescuers. Status: True. Synopsis: On 8 January 1999, Disney announced
a recall of the the home video version of their 1977 animated feature The
Rescuers because it contained an "objectionable background image."
Unlike most rumors 
of
risque words images hidden in Disney's animated films, this one is clearly
true, and the images in question were undeniably purposely inserted into
the movie. The two "topless woman" frames have reputedly been present in
the film ever since its original 1977 theatrical release (a fact apparently
confirmed by Disney, whose spokesperson said that the tampering "was done
more than 20 years ago"), although Disney claims that they were not included
in the 1992 home video version because "it was made from a different print."
Disney also claimed that the images were not placed in the film by any
of their animators, but were inserted during the post-production process.
The company decided to recall 3.4 million copies of the video "to keep
our promise to families that we can trust and rely on the Disney brand
to provide the finest in family entertainment."